High-intensity exercise delays worsening of Parkinson’s disease

Parkinson’s’ disease is the second most common neurological disease in Australia after dementia, affecting 10 million individuals worldwide.

Parkinson’s in characterised by a progressive loss of muscle control, trembling, stiffness, slowness and impaired balance. As the disease progresses, it can become difficult to walk, talk and complete simple tasks.

Previous studies have shown that high-intensity exercise improves motor symptoms but it has been thought that high-intensity exercises would be physically stressful for patients with Parkinson’s disease.

However, a new study led by researchers from Northwestern Medicine and University of Denver suggests that high-intensity exercise three times a week for patients with early-stage Parkinson’s disease is safe and it helps to decrease the worsening of motor symptoms.

This study included a randomised trial consisting 126 participants aged 40 to 80 years old from Northwestern University, Rush University Medical Center, the University of Colorado and the University of Pittsburgh.

Participants enrolled in the Study in Parkinson Disease of Exercise (SPARX) were at an early stage of the disease and not taking Parkinson’s medication – ensuring that the results will be related to exercise only and not affected by medication.

The participants were randomly divided into three groups – High-intensity treadmill exercise (4 days per week, 80%-85% maximum heart rate), moderate-intensity treadmill exercise (4 days per week, 60%-65% maximum heart rate), or wait-list control for six months.

After six months, the scientists rated the participants on a Parkinson’s disease scale ranging from 0 to 108. The higher the number the more severe the symptoms.

Participants had a score of 20 before the exercise. After six months, those in the high-intensity group stayed at 20. The group with moderate exercise got worse by 1.5 points and the group that did not exercise worsened by 3 point – which is a 15 per cent change in the primary signs of the disease and is important to the patient’s quality of life.

The researchers confirmed that it is safe for participants to do high-intensity exercise by giving them a cardiologist-supervised graded exercise test to evaluates their heart’s response to the exercise.

According to this study and the conclusions drawn by the scientists is that patients’ with Parkinson’s’ disease should exercise three times a week with a heart rate of 80 to 85 percent maximum to delay the progression of the symptoms.

Source: JAMA Neurology